Hello and welcome to, where am I?
The King Hero's Journey podcast,
I got a few podcasts on the go now,
so my brain goes, okay, which one, Beth, where are we?
And today I'm super excited to be hosting Brandon Sterling,
as you can see from the banner below,
to talk about the economy.
Brandon's been on many times,
and every time things take a turn
in the dramatic direction
and there's some event in the world,
my first thought is always,
why don't we talk to Brandon
and actually see what's going on?
So I'll bring him on without further ado.
Hello and welcome, Brandon.
Hello, hello, it's good to be back.
Yeah, good to have you here.
Good to get to know you over time.
You know, that's the kind of thing
that we didn't have the luxury of early on
in the pandemic,
because a lot of people just came together
like, you know, kind of trauma bonding, literally.
And you didn't know them from Adam,
but you got to know them
and time is always the best measure of a person,
actually, how they show up over time.
So. Yeah, that's so true.
I was, during that period,
I was having the time of my life.
Right, right.
Well, that's what I noticed
that some people just went down and crashed
and, you know, ended up giving in to things
they didn't want in their body
and, you know, just went through murder,
lost all their money.
And then other people used it as a ramp to like,
oh, I'm going up, I'm doing things here.
That certainly happened for me on a creative level.
That's my answer to everything is create,
when in doubt, create,
but not from a doubtful place,
hopefully from a place where there's some actual freedom.
So that, yeah, we're up and running it.
You guys have heard me talk about my creator code course
that was birthed of my last, I'll say breakdown, right?
That every time life has knocked me down
and it was a series of freak accidents,
you can go and listen to Beth of Fresh Air Episode Number One,
which was also born out of that.
And here it, you know, where I was at
and where I'm at now.
And the whole process that I've used my entire life
to go from a place of feeling like the slate
has been completely cleared after a breakdown,
which is good, that's healing,
but how to begin again, how to come back.
And I know the field of economics is full of that.
I bet you know a bunch of people who made a bunch of money
and lost a bunch of money.
And typically those that go bankrupt have done it several,
or what is it, the stat that millionaires
have often bankrupted one or more times
in their career first.
Yeah, I mean, it's not uncommon,
but what's interesting is it's not the individual
that goes bankrupt, it's often an entity separate themselves.
So in that sense, it actually in some cases can be smart.
Got it, got it.
Yeah, compared to an individual bankrupting
and then having to deal with seven years of no credits
and starting fresh with a credit score.
Yeah, I'm happy with my son, by the way,
my 19 year old is very tuned in to credit
even though he doesn't plan on using any
because he's vicariously learned through you and me.
And, but he's mindful, like I wanna have a card
that gives me a track record and it's fun to see him
because I was not thinking like that at 19, I tell ya.
Yeah, so today we're gonna be talking about
the thing that did spark the wanting to have
Brandon on again was the news when Trump broke in
and removed Maduro, it was a Maduro,
am I getting the name right from?
Maduro, yeah.
Maduro from his position
and made this dramatic massive international statement
and it's supposedly about an oil plan,
but Brandon, you actually have a really good video
on your YouTube, walking through this,
but for knowing that not everybody has seen that yet,
you can bear repeating if that comes up.
We'll talk about what dumb money is doing right now,
we're gonna talk about the employment crash,
which is very real, we've been seeing that.
Shout out to your trader builder business course
that I've been in.
Can you tell me how long has it been,
are we going on, it's for a year for sure,
but it feels like longer.
How long have you been doing it?
So this August will hit the two year mark actually.
That's what I thought, yeah, yeah, exactly.
And it's been invaluable for someone like myself,
I may or may not trade, I think you know that,
but I come for the knowledge to see
what is actually happening in the markets,
I find it's so interesting.
I'm not able to exactly do anything with it,
but it's good because your imagination is much more
almost always more stressful or more frightening
than what's real.
When you got something real, it's like, okay,
there's a ground and this is what we're working with.
So yeah, that's way better.
We'll talk about the volatility in the stock market
and what the dramatic rise in the value
of precious metals might mean about the economy.
Everyone's chirping about that.
And then we'll talk about the future of the economy,
maybe you see coming compared to what's been
historically patterned out, what might be different now.
So where would you like to begin, Brandon?
Sure, well, let's start with the geopolitical front.
That's the very top of the macro picture right now,
kind of influencing more things down the line
and ultimately reaching our lives.
So let's just start at the very top actually.
And would you like your presentation?
Sure, let's get started.
Okay, perfect.
Now you could all take the banner down just for now,
but you can find Brandon by the way at school.com
backslash trading business backslash about
and I'll share a link as well in the chat as we go.
All right, so everyone is reacting to the headlines
again and we're having talks of World War III,
precious metals are going to the moon.
So we have a lot to cover
and I'll explain why these things are happening.
But as a trader, I look at the instructional math
and I'm not just looking at 2026,
I'm actually looking at the next decade
of geopolitical rewiring.
So we'll cover why Venezuela, Greenland and Iran
aren't the quick fixes savior.
You can promise from the Trump admin in the media.
We'll also cover why precious metals break out
is a systematic signal that you just can't ignore right now.
And we'll also cover how to navigate
the frozen labor market that's already being eaten by AI
and I'll show you how to thrive in it outside the system.
Right, that's a very big thing with the AI,
literally eating up the jobs.
So yeah, I definitely want to go deep into that as well.
Yeah, so this isn't about fear base forecasting, okay?
I'm really going to be covering what I call
the great decoupling of labor and wealth
and the data I'll provide will show why energy,
hegemony is really the only end game that matters
when it comes to geopolitics.
So if you don't understand the shift from working
for money to being in the know,
you're going to be on the wrong side
of the largest well transfer in history.
Can you define hegemony?
Yeah, so basically, I'll give you an example.
So the US right now, the US dollar has the hegemony
when it comes to world currency, world reserve.
Now on the energy front, the US is also trying
to be the biggest player when it comes to energy hegemony.
So there's a few countries battling it out right now
and that's why we're seeing what we're seeing in the news.
So hegemony would be like eminence being the leader.
Yes, exactly.
Okay, perfect.
Good, so I'll stop you when I don't understand things
if that's all right.
Sure, yeah.
It'll help everybody too.
Brendan, you are very smart, you have a lot of knowledge
and so I'll help to translate that at times.
Come and say hello in the chat.
If anybody's there, let us know you're there.
As usual, these streams are extremely shadow banned.
It's getting worse.
People are telling me they have to go looking for me.
They get unsubscribed.
Their comments disappear in my videos.
Sometimes I get off one of these.
There's less views than there were people in the chat.
So it's amazing that it gets out at all
and it's got to be organic.
So help with that would be awesome.
All right, Brendan.
So wherever you would like to go with us.
Ah, Janice Bicello.
Nice to see you.
I haven't seen you for a while.
Yeah, so let's start first with the very macro geopolitics
and world events right now.
So then as we go on, I'll show you these events
and themes are shaping your future down the line.
So like I've been kind of saying on this show
the last couple of years,
the old free trade globalism model has been dying.
Like we've been covering the last couple of years.
So we're starting to see the nails in the coffin emerge.
So right now we're witnessing
a fundamental pivot towards what I call
nation-state protectionism.
And the US right now is utilizing regime change
in strategic posture to monopolize
the physical commodities needed for the next century.
Okay.
And so just to repeat for maybe people who haven't heard
that we have the narrative and the truth world
that we're moving,
they want us to move towards some globalist culture
but where you get one world religion,
one world leader, one politic.
And you've always shown how that's actually not the case.
Yeah. And later as we go on Elf,
hopefully show how evident that is.
Great.
So yeah, everyone's talking about Greenland right now.
I will say don't ignore the Greenland play.
It isn't just a meme that's going around online.
This is actually a strategic mineral acquisition
that the US is trying to get.
Now in this picture, you can see that Greenland
holds 25% of the world's rare earth minerals.
And for context, the rare earth minerals
are what needed to field the next tech boom
that we're seeing in AI and electronics in general.
So right now, the world's powers are really battling out
over minerals amongst other commodities that we'll cover.
So what's interesting about Greenland right now,
it may seem like a meme or media talk right now,
but the US Export-Import Bank actually just issued
a $120 million letter of interest to fund
the tambourines mine here in Greenland
that stores these minerals.
Now what's interesting about this is has the US
we're overriding a soft NATO.
And I say soft NATO because in retrospect,
they've been too soft when it comes to the Russian-Ukraine
confrontation war, let's call it.
And they've been losing that battle
as it's been clear and clear by the day,
despite the propaganda we've been fed the last couple of years.
All Russia is gonna fall over the next day at any point.
That just hasn't been the case.
And we're actually losing battleground
as we speak over in Ukraine.
Now I don't have hopes in the peace talks either.
I think Putin is really riding that out as long as he can.
And just really draining the West,
especially NATO of resources.
And this is important for Putin because,
well, as we've seen through NATO,
European countries have not really been contributing
to that as much as the US.
And the US is talking about overriding NATO here
with this Greenland thing.
If you guys don't know,
Greenland is currently owned by Denmark.
And what's interesting and ironic about that
is over almost a century ago,
I can't remember which president it was at the time,
but they actually signed a treaty
with the current PM of Denmark at that time
agreeing that because Denmark allowed the US
to buy the US Virgin Islands,
we would never try to take Greenland.
Now, a treaty is not a legal document.
It's really just hearsay.
And we can see right now,
with this administration's actions,
they're definitely ignoring that.
As well as NATO,
NATO has threatened to try to protect Greenland.
But as we've seen in through the Ukraine-Russian war,
they don't have the resources to do it, but we do.
So the Greenland thing,
I think might happen sometime soon.
I don't have an exact date, of course, but...
So yeah, Greenland is really the endgame.
And then also Iran is next.
And I'll show you why that is.
Could I ask a quick question?
Sure.
So it sounds like there's literally conflict
between Trump and NATO.
What you're saying is Trump is overriding NATO.
And so maybe you're already gonna speak to that,
but what are the implications
for all the NATO countries, for example?
Well, they've been trying to play tough with words, Omi.
But if we actually look on boosts on the ground
in Greenland,
we have about seven to 11 air bases
or military bases there right now.
That's the most compared to any other nation.
The European Union, they've only provided a handful
in comparison to our capacity there.
Now, Trump, this is what I mean by,
the nation-state protectionism.
Trump is really the first to rattle the cage
with that on the world stage
when it comes to not only the NATO alliance,
he's been talking about how we need to pull out.
It's really just a money drain for us.
And that goes into the isolationism
that I've been forecasting.
And we're seeing it in real time
when it comes to US separating from Europe.
So, Europe, we've seen this just too weak.
And right now, they're actually meeting
at the World Economic Forum as we speak at Davos,
this leader here,
who looks like a gremlin who knows what that is.
But they keep talking to the same talking points.
Well, Trump actually was just there
and he just doubled down,
saying, we will take Greenland
despite the European sentiment.
Right, any chance you're gonna take Canada?
Please take Canada.
So, we won't be able to take it as a whole,
as a 51st state, as it's been touted
by the truth socials post.
The only likely scenario would be that
a province would succeed from Canada
and enter the US.
Right, and we're seeing Alberta
try to position themselves that way.
Alberta is the most likely to do that,
although we have bigger problems on the board right now.
So, I don't anticipate that to happen soon.
Also, when it comes to Carney,
which is interesting is,
the Canadians are the dumbest people ever.
We joke about how Americans are,
but in this latest election cycle,
the fake election,
Carney is really just a banker.
He doesn't represent Canada,
although the liberal Canadians,
which is probably the majority of you guys there,
they believe that he's looking out
for Canada's best interests.
Well, historically, Canada has been
really just a trough of resources
for the British crown.
And if we look at Carney's background,
he was a banker at Goldman Sachs first,
working in New York.
So, it wouldn't be a surprise to me
if Trump and him had a relationship in the decades past.
He was pretty high up in Goldman Sachs.
Now, I know quite a bit about Goldman Sachs.
They really only hire psychopaths.
They kind of screen them out.
It's really interesting how that works,
but they all are delusional.
And unfortunately, when it comes to Carney,
he really is just a not only Goldman Sachs banker,
but he also has a background in central banking.
He was the first foreigner to be
the central bank head for Bank of England.
So, what does that tell you?
The British is still very much in control of Canada.
So, we'll have to see how that plays out.
I don't think the UK would really have the resources
to challenge a province from succeeding.
There might be some legal stops and a lot of lawsuits,
but Trump, he's a TV personality, right?
So even the talks and rumors of this happening
is a win for him.
It gives him a relevancy in the media,
as well as the other things going on right now.
So, bad news or not is good news for Trump.
Got it.
Yeah, they know how to work the media.
That's like they always said in the marketing world
that any publicity is good publicity.
It doesn't matter whether it's bad or wrong.
It gets you out there,
gets people thinking about you,
taking a position for or against you,
which works all for you.
Yeah, and throughout the years,
even as a TV personality,
all the way down to the presidencies,
Trump is really doubled down on that point.
All news is good news.
He has a masterful way of getting people,
even his supporters to hate him,
even turn their back on him.
And then next, he surprises somebody,
the surprise of element, he's great at that.
Keeps everyone on their edge
and gets the base back excited.
So, we'll have to see what happens with this,
but I think there are some things
and some challenges he's gonna have to face,
which we'll talk about.
It's not gonna be some smooth sailing,
like it may sound.
It's not gonna be easy for him to take over Iran.
It's not gonna be easy for him to take over Greenland,
which are really the main two major battlefields right now
when it comes to the world stage.
Okay, and coming back to oil, basically, right?
And that leads me to my next point with Maduro.
You know, we definitely have seen the major ulcer of this guy
and it has triggered a gold rush narrative in the media,
you know, from conservatives,
even to the liberal Bloombergs.
Basically, it's saying that President Trump
is promising a massive revival
of the Venezuela oil industry
within 18 months from now.
However, the gap between geopolitical ambition of Trump
and the geological reality is massive here.
So it's not gonna be as smooth sailing as it may sound.
Okay.
So the promise is the U.S. is gonna help expand operations
of Venezuela and start making money,
basically, off this oil in under 18 months.
But the reality is, you know,
a lot of oil experts are saying, you know,
this is gonna take closer to the five to seven years,
actually, just to double production
to two million barrels per day.
Now, the price tag is another issue here.
So, you know, returning to the glory days
of Venezuela for three million barrels of production
would cost about 183 billion from now through 2020, 2040, actually.
And really the only ones that are gonna be responsible
for that would be, of course,
the publicly traded companies like Chevron,
that's the only oil refiner there right now,
thanks to Joe Biden's lift on sanctions.
Right.
I know you're gonna get into it that, like,
the quality of the oil is not even good
and it's not comparable, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, that gets me into the engineering bottleneck
that we're facing here.
So on this chart, you can see over here
on the right side of this, it's hard to see,
but Venezuelan oil actually is considered
a low value oil worldwide.
Now, I'll give you some background on this.
Venezuela, it just doesn't pump oil,
it pumps what the oil industry calls sludge.
So their reserves in the Oranico Belt
are what are called heavy sour crude,
which is too thick, it's literally so thick
it can't flow through pipelines
or be processed by standard refineries.
So to move this oil, you need what are called Upgraders,
which are basically massive, multi-billion dollar,
mini-refineries that turn this Venezuelan sludge
into sin crude.
So out of the four major Upgraders,
only one run by Chevron, of course,
I'll take a mention earlier, is currently functional.
The others are rusted out or stripped for parts
as we speak.
So you cannot simply just reboot these units,
you actually have to rebuild them all together.
Right, yeah, that's huge.
Yeah, so the headline about the US seizing,
the 30, 50 billion barrels,
and it's gonna make us rich.
It sounds massive, right?
But let's put it into quantitative context here.
So the volume would be 50 million barrels,
it's roughly two and a half days worth
of US total oil consumption.
So it wouldn't even amount to that much,
even if the miracle did happen,
we have of revising the Venezuelan oil industry.
Now let's get back to the, oh, go ahead.
Has the math hit the mainstream?
Like, have they had to respond to that
or they just throw out the numbers
and everybody goes, ooh, ah, to a big number?
A little bit, more on niche channels like Bloomberg.
I don't really watch too much of the media to be honest,
but that's kind of a more of a smart money outlet.
And I have seen some presenters kind of bring this up.
I don't think they mentioned the two and a half days
of total US oil consumption though.
That's something I discovered recently on my own.
Yeah, do in the math, be in the quant.
Yeah, yeah, so the back to the quality issue,
bunch of this sanctioned oil
is literally sitting on rusted tankers.
So it's high sulfur.
It's dirty, meaning it can't go anywhere, right?
So it must go through complex Gulf Coast refineries.
It's not like we can just take it back to the US.
And these Gulf Coast refineries
are already at high capacity as we speak.
So for traders, or even for that matter,
normies at home, the Venezuela story
is really more of a long duration play.
This is not gonna provide a short-term supply shock
and make oil cheaper all of a sudden.
All of a sudden you pay less at the pump.
I'll talk about why oil has kind of gasoline in particular
has gone down in price, but it has nothing to do
with Venezuela.
It was actually happening before all of this already.
Okay.
Yeah, just anecdotally, the gas prices
have been fairly reasonable lately,
fluctuating in a lower range.
And then all of a sudden I'm driving the other day
and it's like kaboom, it's way up all of a sudden
for us anyway.
Yeah, so oil has actually hit a 12-week high recently.
So I'll be talking about why I'm actually,
my outlook on oil is actually bullish,
meaning I think it's gonna go up
in the next year or two at least.
So you might be happy to pump right now,
but you better fill it now.
Right, so stock up.
So lately I've been just filling
up as much as I can.
Right, right.
Yeah, it's interesting,
because my son has become a fan of HEVs,
the hybrid electric vehicles.
Oh, fun.
Yeah, yeah.
So that you've got that to rely back on
and not going full on EV, but yeah.
Oh, that's very based of him.
I think he sees through the EV illusion.
I think we saw some projections,
especially in California,
where they're gonna get rid of all combustion oil
of engines by 2030.
And that's just simply not gonna be possible,
especially at the price of these things.
More than ever, EVs have been higher and higher in price.
And that's actually why a car manufacturers
and their stocks are suffering as we speak.
Not enough people are interested in buying that.
And a lot of people are priced
out of the car market in general.
The EVs are even more expensive
than your standard truck or utility vehicle
or even just a passenger vehicle.
Yeah, if I could jump in here,
we do have this illusion, I'd say,
that the corporations are just pushing
all their agendas on us
and they're gonna do this and do that.
But this is an example where the consumer spoke.
They took a look at it.
They saw a few fires.
They looked at it.
The truck looks, Elon's truck looks like a dumpster.
Yeah.
It became like a favorite way to make fun of things.
And then so the people chose.
And then the corporations inevitably,
they go with the people
because the people have the money.
Yeah.
I mean, everyone that's, you know, an Elon stand,
they believe that Cybertruck was gonna, you know,
really bring back the profitability of Tesla.
That simply hasn't happened.
They haven't sold barely any units
compared to their earlier models.
So, you know, my outlook on Tesla
especially is pretty bearish in the long term.
But you have to be careful on the timing with that one
just because there's so many suckers
when it comes to Tesla stock.
Okay.
Yeah.
So would you call the people doing Tesla stocks
dumb money?
I would, you know, in fact,
it's one of the most popular stocks amongst dumb money.
Okay.
Yeah.
There you go.
You know, they're the same crowd
that's like AI is our God kind of people.
I'll talk about that too later.
How I, you know,
I'm not so hopeful that AI will really be our God per se
but it will impact our life in a negative way.
There's some ways we, you know,
I'll present that can kind of navigate that,
but yeah, I mean, with the dropping prices in gasoline,
you know, it has kind of made the practability
at EVs even less.
But I think, you know,
those days are gonna be over here soon.
There's a lot happening in the world
that's gonna make oil more expensive
here in the near future.
All right.
So yeah, you know, the oil is there in Venezuela.
I'll kind of go over, you know,
these numbers might be fudged by Maduro and Chavez,
the communist dictators.
But, you know, if we're going off the paper numbers
that they did present,
the oil is there in the pie,
is there, but the pipes are broken.
So until the upgraders are rebuilt,
Venezuela is really just an asset-rich country
with a frozen cash flow at the moment.
Now it's also interesting about oil right now
is there was a relationship between oil and the dollar,
not only because of the petrodollar,
but, you know, you're the date the US dollar
has lost about 20 or 10% in purchasing value.
So a weaker dollar historically
is a push for oil prices to go higher.
Okay.
So, you know, this quick fix to the US economy
when it comes to Venezuela
is really just a lie, you know,
and I'll go through the Venezuelan reserves
are actually a fantasy,
but to understand why the Venezuela gold rush is a mess,
you have to understand the physical chemistry
of the barrel first.
So what is crude oil?
Well, you know, it has different grades,
as I was showing you earlier on a world stage.
You know, it takes a lot of refinery
and as you can see here,
it consists of many different chemical composite
and the quality is going to vary.
You know, wextest is crude oil,
other wise known as WTI
is actually some of the lightest oil here,
as you can see on the left side.
As compared to Venezuela,
Pilon, which is here on the far right almost,
is actually the furthest right one in the world.
So this is the lowest value oil in the world.
Unlike water, crude oil is not a chemical compound,
as it may sound.
It's going to be a complex of hydrocarbon molecules.
So just as water boils at 212 degrees,
each compound in the crude oil
has its own unique boiling temperature.
So the more carbon atoms in a molecule,
the higher the temperature
at which it boils and vaporizes.
So the phenomenon permits crude oil
to be refined into so many products
but before that it must be refined
and manufactured gasoline and heating oil
at the quality that the world demands.
All right.
So yeah, a large part of refinery or refining
is simply converting the unwanted low value fuel oil
into wanted gasoline that we pay for at the pump
before a refiner buys a single cargo,
refiner being like Chevron, for example.
So they look at crude oil as an assay, they call it.
This is a complete chemical evaluation
and each refiner has their own different assay
of the particular crude oil type.
So it tells the refiner if the oil is compatible
with their industrial hardware or not.
So we value crude oil based on the two primary metrics.
The first one is API gravity.
And that's just meaning how light or heavy the oil is
right in the barrel.
And then number two is the sulfur content.
So lighter of course is gonna be what's called sweet.
So that's US shale oil, Canadian shale oil
for that matter is some of the sweetest in the world.
And then we have the sour of course
that's more heavy is what it's called.
And so you had a slide with the breakdown
composition of it.
Can we see that one more time?
Yeah, do you want me to go back?
Let's see.
Right, yeah, hydrogen plus carbon equals hydrocarbons.
Interestingly, I mean, this is the makings
of carbon dioxide, right?
Like you got the carbon, it's the demonized element.
It's supposedly the one that said,
I don't know if there's anything to tie in there
about the whole climate hoax.
You know, there is, you know,
there's still a big push for renewal energy, renewable.
But, you know, especially with the data centers
popping up around the world, you know,
the renewables is just simply not to be enough.
It's more costly in fact.
And the infrastructure just simply isn't there.
It doesn't work as good as well.
So, you know, really, ever since 2024,
we've really seen a lot of nation states
ditching the renewables.
So now we're getting more into the nuclear energy realm
and just really hydrocarbons as we can see here.
So, yeah, you know, as, you know,
the economic value increases and it gets lighter
and sulfur decreases, lighter crudes
contain more valuable components like gasoline,
which the world still runs on in a very large part.
All right, thank you.
Yeah.
So, yeah, Venezuela on paper has more
than 300 billion barrels of oil,
which roughly estimates to 17%
of the world's known oil reserves.
It's gonna be in the Carcaraz area here in Venezuela
as I've shown you on the map.
Most of these reserves are in vast deposits
in what's called that Oranico oil belt.
And it might be mispronounced
and I'm not the best Spanish speaker.
You know, I have a very time rolling my tongue,
but there's even more potential underground
is what they're touting the Venezuelan government.
But even if that is true,
it's still gonna be high sulfur,
it's still gonna be dirty and heavy
and cost of the refining like as we've been going.
So, a refiner would clearly be paying more per barrel
for light, sweet, West Texas intermediate oil
than the Venezuelan Pilon.
Makes sense.
Yeah, so let's just go skip to the next one.
When you hear that Venezuela has
the world's largest proven oil reserves,
you gotta remember this is about two thirds
of that number comes from the Chavez-Menduro government.
So they're probably using generous assumptions
to reclassify large volumes
of lower utility heavy crew
as recoverable.
Now, what's interesting is Venezuelan
is a founding member of OPEC
and their official statistics show
that its production is down 71% from its 1998 peak.
I believe that was in the Chavez days.
So Venezuelan crude is so thick,
like I was saying earlier,
it can't throw a flow through a pipe to move it.
You're gonna need, you know,
heavy machinery and operators.
And so, you know,
this is gonna be a multi-billion dollar project.
And, you know, that's really the reality check.
So out of the, you know,
the companies like Chevron,
they've actually been saying
this is not functional for them.
Now, there are all their rustic skeletons
stretched for parts
and you just can't reboot those units.
So, you know, the energy experts,
SMA, that'll take five to seven years,
183 billion through 2040,
just to hit two days of US gas supply.
So what's Trump thinking?
Like, what's the scam here
that he would go so public with a move
that really isn't...
That's a good question, actually.
So it has less to do with the oil
because, you know, if he has advisors worth their salt,
they would be showing this.
This is not hard to find, guys.
Anyone can find this on the internet.
You know, the big play is really just to damage Russia
and their funding for the Ukraine war
and then also lower Chinese oil supply.
Venezuela is, you know, on paper
about 4% of Chinese oil supply.
Okay.
But there is actually a lot more
that's undocumented, which I'll kind of talk about.
So he's really just hitting those two.
You know, he does have a talk with Xi coming up
this spring.
It's gonna be the trade talk, of course,
which is kind of funny
because he's coming to Xi.
And I think because of not only that,
but other things, Xi has more leverage
over Trump in this negotiation right now.
You know, just as the U.S. has been siloed
from the world more and more as time goes on,
so has China.
And, you know, China has close relationships
with most countries in the U.S. right now.
You know, their diplomacy really has to do more with,
hey, let's give you money
and we'll provide the resources and manpower
to reconstruct your infrastructure.
Meanwhile, the U.S. is doing regime change
and stuff like that, right?
Can you define siloed?
Yeah, just getting more isolationist,
you know, the nation state becoming more protectionism
rather than trying to work the globalization model.
Got it.
Yeah, so what are we looking at here on this chart?
Yeah, we can see that, you know,
and this is another on-paper number,
which I'm skeptical of, I think it might be even lower,
of Venezuela oil production.
It's actually less than one-third of his level
at the start of Maduro's presidency.
So, you know, Chávez was really the peak of it in 98.
And as Maduro ruled, it just got lower and lower.
Okay.
Okay, so this is the rusted oil storage units
that I was talking about,
which would be impossible to store the oil in
that they could pull out of Venezuela.
So this is actually a satellite image
of Porto Morando storage facility,
and I'm probably mispronouncing that, guys.
Again, I don't really care for Spanish
or South American culture that much.
But one from, this is from 2022, this first picture.
It shows white, clean tank tops.
And then this is actually from last year, 2025.
It's showing, you know, as you can see orange and black,
you know, that's signs of rusting.
So, you know, when this sits idle for years,
they just don't stay empty.
They're gonna corrode and leak over time.
So a third of the country's storage is likely unusable.
Right.
And I mentioned that would be extremely polluting,
like rust doesn't go in an oil, right?
Yeah, which is something, you know,
the Venezuelan government just simply doesn't care about.
Right, right.
Quick aside for anyone who likes the different kind
of culinary salts that are out there
and think they're more healthy.
Himalayan salt is red because of rust,
and that's poison for the body
as well as the oil in your car.
Yeah, that's one of the biggest nutrition scams
out there is the Himalayan salt.
You know, people still think that's better.
Even the lamps are gonna give off wrong ions.
Yeah, I'm very picky about my salt.
I actually get it from a local salt mine here where I'm at.
Nice.
It is patented for heavy metals
and yeah, definitely lower compared to your average.
That's great.
Well, yeah, you know, this is industrial savage.
You know, there's almost no rigs
up in Venezuela right now as well.
So it's gonna be nearly impossible
to bring the additional capacity given
to Venezuela infrastructure issue
even if the US wanted to rebuild it.
If you can't get the product to market,
it really doesn't matter if you have it, right?
So the recent Alistair of Maduro,
you know, this is what I'm talking about
with the geopolitical ambition of Trump
versus the reality of geological reality.
So, you know, this is not gonna work out.
And I, you know, as I was alluding to,
this has more to do with try to damage Russia and China.
The major competitors of the US, of course, right now.
So...
Yeah, can you unpack that a little bit more?
What would the damage be
that they're being supported in this war?
So basically, it helps funding.
It's mainly the funding for Russians.
That's like, I believe, right now,
close to 40% of their funding comes from oil sales,
which a lot of them, the Russian tankers actually,
I don't know if you guys saw in the news,
but the Russian tankers,
they're trying to hide that they're Russian at first.
They try to hide under shell companies.
And that's the ships that the US sees right now
as I have in the picture.
They're just kind of floating off the coast.
We sees them.
It wasn't until the US Navy confronted them
that they actually raised the Russian flag
and all of a sudden overcommunication said,
hey, we're actually part of the Russian state.
If you try to hit us, then you're ruining diplomacy here.
Now, what's interesting is, on the surface,
Putin seems like the toughest world leader.
But what's fascinating is with this recent Navy action,
they just let it happen.
Trump and Putin had a phone call
and it looks like Putin just let the tankers go.
And so any implications of that?
Yes, they're gonna have to find other sources of funding
for them.
China was actually the biggest buyer
of Russian acquisition to oil.
So next, this also makes them more reliant on Iran.
Now that Venezuela is out of the picture.
Iran is the next,
is actually the biggest exporter
to Chinese oil storage.
So this is really gonna make them depend more on Iran
and Trump's plan is really to move in on Iran next.
Now there is kind of a problem with that.
I don't know if you guys saw in the news recently,
but there was some protests in Iran
over the current Iranian government.
I'm not sure the exact details,
but I do know that based on the US cabinet's words on Twitter,
they kind of were alluding to that
those were Assad agents starting the riots.
So it wasn't organic, it was definitely CIA, Mossad.
And it actually, the Iranian government
actually shut the protesters down faster
than US and Israel were expecting.
They shut it down because the Trump was trying to tell
that, hey, we'll move in, we'll help you as protesters,
help is on the way.
And that originally was the first thing to really kick off
this recent rally in oil, which I'll show you in a second,
but that ultimately failed.
And now it's lower probability that Trump
in the US for that matter,
will be able to do a regime change in Iran.
They're kind of pinned in a corner right now.
So I'm not sure if they're gonna back down.
I doubt they will.
But I don't think it's gonna be as successful as it may sound.
Very good.
So yeah, these are over 30 station vessels
that were idling off the coast.
And we seized about 40 million barrels
that were currently in storage, mostly Russian tankers.
But that is a one-time event.
And the real challenge isn't moving the oil, right?
It's already, that's already pumped,
it's fixing the broken industry.
Got it.
So let's talk about China a little bit more.
So there's something called teapots.
And no, I'm not talking about some blokes in Britain
in their little tea parties,
just a little gay in my opinion.
I'm just kidding.
These are independent Chinese refiners
operating on thin margins.
So they stay alive by buying sanctioned oils
that are at steep discounts because of the sanctions, right?
Official Chinese data claimed they imported
30,000 barrels a day in 2020.
But the data shows that the real number
was actually over 500,000 barrels in 2025.
So Venezuela crewed accounted for roughly three to 5%.
I just go in the middle and say four
of China's total oil imports.
So they also hid this by using shadow fleas
just like the Russians.
So these tankers turn off transporters
and they spoof their location signals.
And they're really trying to hide that this was happening.
And then once it reaches Asia,
they'll rebrand the oil as Malaysian blend
or Brazilian crew to bypass sanctions
to avoid US sanctions, of course.
So the Venezuelan oil is frequently transported
via ship to ship transfers.
So these ships often engage in stressed transfers
of what it's called.
And again, they're turned off the transporters,
they're spoofing their location
to hide their true origin.
I'm naive to think that somehow
they wouldn't be resorting to those kind of strategies.
That seems old world compared to where we're at these days.
But there's like, oh yeah, I'm not who you think I am.
I'm cloaked.
Yeah, it's almost in a way a false flag.
But on a kind of more micro scale,
definitely undetected compared to false flag
like the Harmuz attacks we've had in the past.
So, you know, this is China's sneaky way
of avoiding something like that
and then being accused of doing something like this.
Now, according to the China's general admission,
administration of customs,
China imported 30,000 barrels per day of crude
from Venezuela in 2024.
And more than half of Venezuela's crude oil exports.
So this is about 768,000 barrels per day.
Last year went to China.
So, you know, some ships they're able to pass by freely
through the blockades and they are American.
In the US imports, you know,
20% of Venezuela oil produced
by the US oil company Chevron,
which was exempted from sanctions I was telling you about
through Joe Biden in 2022.
So, you know, despite having a large footprint on paper,
the Chinese companies are not the largest producers
in Venezuela, Chevron of course is.
So, Chinese production might be about 10%
by securing this oil,
but the US has neutralized Russia's ability
to launder these profits through sanctions evasion.
So, China isn't just a buyer actually,
they're also a lender when it comes to South America
and really worldwide.
Especially in Africa as well.
Chinese financial institutions,
primarily the Chinese Development Bank,
they loaned Venezuela around 60 billion
through 17 different loan contracts.
So that's about half of Chinese loans
committed to Latin America as of 2023.
Now, the repayment was supposed to be
in the oil shipments to China.
In certain Canadian and Iraqi grades,
my too expensive, right?
So the Chinese want the cheaper oil.
So, you know, they thought that was a fair deal
and that was part of the term.
Now that that's ruined, of course,
I think the US wants to truly starve, you know,
what if we go off of old world terms, access,
Iran's floating terminals in the Persian Gulf
are gonna be the next target
when it comes to the oil trade.
So if the US uses the same tactics
that they use in the straight of harm moves
in the past, it could shave off,
you know, quite a bit of global GDP
and that would really cement US energy hegemony.
So China has actually condemned Trump
in this military operation to remove Maduro.
It's not a shock.
And they actually called for the immediate release
and stopped toppling the Venezuelan government
as they say.
So, you know, despite Beijing's displeasure
with the events in their Venezuela,
there are some civil linings for China out of this.
So first, Chinese officials are capitalizing
on the US intervention to portray the US
as kind of a bully on the world stage,
a violator of international law, international maritime law
and a source of regional instability.
So, you know, especially with this regime change.
So second, Beijing can also take advantage
of the US strike on Venezuela
to push back against any US criticism of Chinese efforts
to bolster its claims to disputed parts
of the South China Sea,
which have been going on for a while now.
You know, it's really making Japan
and South Korea nervous actually,
this activity in the South China Sea.
Really, there's nothing they can do about it
without the US.
However, despite all that,
Beijing is unlikely to view this US intervention
as a justification for the action against Taiwan,
which China regards as an internal affair.
They do consider Taiwan to be China.
And if you speak to any Chinese person,
they'll tell you that.
And you know, if you go on boost on the ground,
that's certainly true.
The culture is still China, you know, they're very Chinese.
So in the very near term,
and same with Hong Kong for that matter,
but in the very near term,
major Chinese crude companies
are also bearing the brunt of oil production reductions
in response to the US blockade here.
All right.
So yeah, Russia's ability to fund its war in Ukraine
is tied directly to global oil prices.
So the higher the oil prices,
the better it is for Russia, of course.
And this kind of acts as a double-edged sword
for the Kremlin.
So you know, Russian diplomats frame the US operation
against Maduro kind of like the Chinese
as a armed aggression and called for the release,
you know, basically repeating China there.
But Putin remained a mom on the issue.
Like I was saying, he just kind of held back
as the US took over his tankers.
Even though Russia has invested billions in Venezuela.
So in addition, the US seizure of tankers
linked to Venezuelan oil exports
has a direct implications for Russia's
sanctioned invasion system.
So, you know, that was part of the hype
around the whole bricks bros narrative.
That like we saw the last few years
and that's definitely damaged that narrative.
You know, we still haven't seen any bricks buck.
I've gone through why bricks is just impossible
or bricks dollar in the past show with you, Beth.
But you know, in short, there's no central power
in bricks and to have a central currency,
you have to have a central bank.
So how are you gonna have a central bank
amongst all of these nations?
They don't even get along with each other.
You know, India and Russia have complicated relationship
as well as China and India amongst, you know, other things.
South Africa has a problem with Russia as well.
So, you know, the list could go on
and that's why we haven't seen anything for bricks.
But now the whole, I'll go in.
Oh, I was just thinking about that exact thing.
How, how frightened, I guess it was,
was it 2022 or something?
Everyone is just freaking out about bricks
and they were so mad at you, Brandon,
when you, when you came out and said,
no, actually this is not even,
and then what do we hear about it now?
Nothing?
Nothing.
Right?
Yeah, that's so true.
You know, they're all excited about it.
And then, yeah, it's just been a nothing burger.
Yeah.
So, you know, this really cements my point
that I've been saying over the years, you know,
because Russia was, of course, you know,
sanction evading with these oil sales
through countries like Venezuela and others, Iran.
But this is certainly damaging to that narrative.
But yeah, you know, the events of Venezuela,
it really just exposes Russia's limits
as a security guarantor.
They definitely couldn't secure
even their own tankers.
So, yeah, you know, despite Putin's loud combination,
Moscow was unable to prevent this operation.
You know, as Trump was bragging this, you know,
this was a very smooth regime change,
probably one of the smoothest in history.
It was over in a matter of days.
Right.
And why was Putin tight-lipped about it?
He probably just said it.
Well, he wasn't tight-lipped.
He actually did condemn you as for this.
Okay.
It was more so when, you know, the ships,
his ships were actually seized.
He just let Trump happen to it.
They apparently had a phone call.
That's the rumor.
And I'm not sure what was said during that call,
but it must have been interesting.
Now, I will say, despite how conflicting this all looks,
they are part of the same club, you know,
so it's not too much of a surprise
that they're getting along more
than what the news might make you believe.
You know, now more than ever in 2026,
we're gonna be seeing more propaganda.
You know, we saw a lot of propaganda
during the Ukraine war from, you know,
Joe Biden's presidency from, what, 20,
early 2020s, you know, 2022-ish,
you know, lots of propaganda.
And I think we're gonna see similar propaganda,
if not worse, with all of these fronts being activated.
And do you have a guess at what the specific nature
of the propaganda would be?
Yeah, I think the main purpose is really for the U.S.
to say like, oh, we're still,
we're still the strongest military.
You know, no one can mess with us,
fuck around and find out, as Trump has said.
You know, so far it has hold to be true,
but I will say, if we look at China historically,
they are not as imperialist as the U.S. has been
historically, so I don't really even think China
is interested in combating the U.S. in this.
They're just trying to make money sneakily.
Right.
There you go.
So, you know, out of all that said,
I don't anticipate a World War III happening.
You know, I don't know if you guys have noticed,
but people are softer than ever.
And this would really be a drone war and airstrikes.
When it comes to airstrikes, the U.S. still
is the top dog in that front,
as well as, you know, this is a currency war.
So there is still no currency to replace the dollar,
as we're speaking.
World reserves have gone down a little bit.
When we last spoke, it was about 60% of world reserves.
Now it's closer to 40%, actually,
but I'll show you why nation states
are actually going more into gold.
Okay.
So yeah, you know, currently oil revenues for Russia
has fallen from 50% to actually 25%
of Russia's state income.
So any further price drop caused
by the Venezuelan recovery,
which is kind of the counterpoint in my argument,
it would directly limit the Kremlin's ability
to maintain its massive drone and missile campaigns,
which has gotten better over the years
and they've definitely been testing out in Ukraine.
But I don't think that's gonna happen.
I think oil prices are gonna go higher.
So this probably will help make up
for some of the laws here in Venezuela.
Very good.
So on this chart is actually the crude oil futures.
Just basically meaning how markets are pricing crude oil.
So crude oil is actually reaching a 12-week high
and this comes along with everything I was talking about.
There's also other issues,
political risks and supply disruptions actually,
contrary to the narrative on media.
So Trump announced the cancellation of meetings
with Iranian officials
until the protest stopped, of course,
as I was mentioning earlier,
and warned the help is on the way.
That kind of fizzled out.
So he moves on to implementing a 25% tariff
on goods linked to Iran.
So that was just imposed.
And this is hiding the fear of regional tension.
And this would of course affect oil flows.
So prices, they're being supported by the disruption
at the Caspian pipeline consortium that's in Kazakhstan.
There's also bad weather
and maintenance has really suffered on that front.
So what's also interesting is drone strikes
have cut lows nearly in half
to be about 900,000 barrels per day.
So supply has definitely reduced already
and I don't see that slowing down.
And this of course would make oil more expensive.
Kazakhstan's largest producer,
they actually halted the output of their oil fields
following mysterious fires
at a power generation facilities across the country.
So at the same time, traders are assessing this
and the rising geopolitical tensions
between the US and Europe actually.
And this of course goes back to the image of Davos
which we're seeing right now.
President Trump has doubled down
on the Greenland narrative and his address at Davos.
And he keeps saying, hey, we're gonna secure Greenland.
I'm downplaying the resistance from you, EU,
you guys are too weak, which is actually true.
So the escalation has really raised concerns
about broader US-EU trade, which I don't think,
I think this trend will continue
because as I was saying earlier,
we're seeing the nation-state really go
into protectionism mode, but US really kicking that off.
I think they figured, hey, if we don't do it,
someone else will, so let's be the first to do it.
Right.
Yeah, I don't know where I saw it on the chat somewhere
but they were saying is Cuba next,
but you're saying Iran would be more of a target
even though that's not a realistic one.
You know, Russia does have a bit of a stronghold on Cuba
that is a threat, but I don't think it's as big.
Cuba doesn't have as many natural resources as Greenland does.
Greenland, like I was showing earlier,
has 25% of the rare earth's minerals worldwide.
So Greenland is more of a priority than Cuba.
Cuba is just a shithole, wouldn't really provide us
any value.
It really is just a Russia's way of trying to move in
closer to the US, but we can easily,
unfortunately, I don't wanna get excited about that,
but the US could easily take that out if they ever needed
if it was immediate threat,
but I don't think that's immediate threat right now.
Right.
Now, that could change, but as of right now,
as we speak, that's how it is.
So yeah, with all that said,
this is part of the reason why I'm actually bullish
on crude oil.
Now here in this chart,
this is a technical analysis standpoint,
meaning just reading the chart.
When it comes to commodities,
I'd like to start with the macro outlook
and then we do the technical analysis on the chart.
And the chart is showing that crude oil
has been setting up this shape.
It's called a bullish pendant pattern,
and this has been shaping for years,
even during the oil drama that we saw in Biden's presidency.
So this is finally starting to break out,
as we can see here.
And this isn't really just a macro story.
The charts are starting to confirm
what the fundamentals are telling us.
So if we dig a little bit deeper,
what I have on here is as of January 20th, 2026,
this chart is showing that smart money,
mostly hedge funds and large institutions
like pension funds,
have been quietly building massive positions
in the oil market,
and they're betting on it going up.
In the last two weeks,
we've seen a massive 106,000 contracts surge
through the long side,
meaning that they're betting on it going up.
So this isn't just buying.
It's also just a frantic cover of short positions
that they did have months prior on oil
as geopolitical risk and Iran and Russia re-emerge.
So this is just showing fund managers.
They aren't just looking at next month,
they're actually looking at the supply gap
that we're going to have this year
and probably until at least 2030.
So they're really just positioned for a supply cliff
where demand continues to rise driven by AI data centers
that needs a lot of power
and we don't have enough power for worldwide
and global industrialization as well.
That comes with that.
So the ability to turn on the taps
just has really been crippled
as I was showing you guys earlier in the supply.
Now let's get into gold as well.
We've been seeing, actually, I'm skipping ahead.
Let's go back to oil.
We've had years of consolidation,
but looking at the chart is pulling tighter and tighter.
And this usually signals, especially as we see lower lows
throughout the years
that this is gonna be making a big breakout eventually.
And by tighter and tighter,
do you mean that the ups and the downs are tighter?
Yeah, exactly.
Okay, yep.
And I kind of demonstrated through these lines that I drew
and thought this is the pen and sheet.
So yeah, you know, smart money,
they must know something, right?
If they're betting on oil,
you know, they know that Venezuela oil boom
is really a more longer term play
that's not gonna happen anytime soon if it does happen.
It's not a 2026 story.
And they're using the Trump headlines actually in dumb money
buying into the headlines as liquidity
to build their positions here.
You know, while dumb money sells because they think,
you know, they're betting on oil going down
because they think supply is coming based on the news,
we can see that institutions are buying up the pieces
because they know that supply
is at least five years out in $103 billion away.
Our friend Sam is in the chat and he's saying,
shows how green energy isn't all that it's hyped up
to be with smart money betting on oil, right?
It's so true.
Yeah.
So yeah, you know, while the energy sector is battling
the supply glut and cooling price for price floor last year,
we're seeing a total decoupling
in the hard ass of space in general, not only just oil.
If oil is the blood of the current economy,
it makes the world go around.
Gold and silver actually becoming the insurance policy
for the next one.
So that leads me next to gold here.
As of today, actually gold made a new all-time high.
You know, now it's at $4,767 an ounce.
You know, and it really started a rallying last year.
And you guys might have seen me in past shows saying,
you know, a few years ago I was bearish on gold
and silver for that matter.
And that was because of different situation we're in.
You know, the Federal Reserve,
they were cutting or hiring interest rates,
which is generally bearish for gold.
But the opposite had came true
start of end of last year actually,
the Fed flipped the script
and now they're what the Delmoney would say printing money.
So this is going to be, you know, historically
and what we're seeing right now
is bullish for precious metals.
You know, the last time that precious metals rallied
was actually in 2011 during the last quantitative easing
cycle from the Fed.
So, you know, just as we look at how oil is trending
towards $60 a barrel now,
typically that's a deflationary signal,
but there is divergence as energy costs,
you know, which is really the biggest
expensive for miners drop.
So gold and silver are soaring,
not only because of that, but some more reasons.
You know, this isn't just a commodity rally in general.
It's just a margin explosion for the mining companies.
You know, in Canada, you have a lot of silver miners there.
So the Commitment of Traders report,
which was similar to the crude oil, this one,
this is on crude oil, but there's another one.
This is the silver chart, by the way.
It's exploding to almost 100 ounce.
We can see the Commitment of Traders report
that they've had a massive net long position,
meaning they've been betting on it going up for a while.
And I've been telling my trading community,
you might not want to sell your physical press medals
if you do have some.
I'm still bullish leading into 2027 at the very least,
based on what we're seeing in the world.
So the Commitment of Traders is showing as well
that they are also thinking the same thing.
So you really don't want to fight that.
The institutions, they're gonna have better data
than you, so they must know something.
Right, right.
Yeah, things can change,
since I've known you, your message around precious metals
was that it's not a good investment.
It's still true that if you're looking at an ROI,
that it's really not exactly there.
Because the last time you were on,
you said, yeah, now is a good time to sell silver.
As time goes on, as a trader,
my outlook has to change based on the macro fundamentals,
especially when it comes to commodities.
So during those periods, yeah, that's what I was seeing.
And historically, especially silver,
it does underperform inflation.
So while silver and gold is exploding right now,
you also have to count in that the dollar lost
on paper, 10% purchasing power.
But I think that's a bit light.
If we actually look at the purchasing manager's decisions
when it comes to manufacturing and services
in the US economy,
they've been raising prices the last two years,
consistently each month.
So you can't tell me that inflation is only
close to 3% right now.
It's definitely higher than that.
And you guys can definitely know that
through ancestral experience.
And then that trend is not gonna stop,
especially for 2026 is what I'm looking at even next year.
Prices are gonna continue to go up on goods and services.
So even though gold and silver has rallied,
you do have to count in your purchasing power
as significantly gone down.
So have you really gained that much?
I mean, a little, I guess, in the short term,
but if we look in the long term,
especially silver, it does underperform inflation.
Right.
And so the truth and narrative around silver
and gold being high is that it is
because the dollar is dying,
it's taking it's last breath.
Well, it's not the last breath.
The last breath would be when the dollar
officially finds a replacement.
The world finds a replacement for it
for the world reserves.
And no one's been able to do so since the 70s.
So, yeah, until we see that,
I just don't think the dollar is on its last days.
It's still the most traded currency in the world.
Oil is still traded in the dollar.
So, especially what we've been seeing
with the oil action, like I highlighted,
that isn't gonna end anytime soon.
Right.
Based on what I'm seeing now.
You're very good.
Just a quick heads up,
if I need to drop out for a minute,
I'm still here in the background
and I didn't go away, but it could happen.
Yeah, so now that energy was cheap last year,
the metals have become expensive.
The miners, they aren't just producing gold,
they're producing record-breaking cash flow.
So if you look at the central bank actions,
they've been buying more gold as well.
We can see that of smaller countries,
I've actually been buying more gold
than let's say the bigger players like US and China.
China, who has been buying less gold
than they were in 2022 and 2023.
Poland actually was the 2025 leader here
on the most aggressive buying this year
when it comes to gold.
Added roughly about 83 tons to its reserves
through October, 2025.
So their central bank governor
has really set a target for gold
to reach 30% of their total reserves.
Now we were mentioning Kazakhstan earlier.
What's interesting is they've consistently
added to their holdings as well.
I think they anticipated what I was highlighting earlier
in the decrease in oil supply.
So with the increase of gold purchasing,
Kazakhstan now has nearly 41 tons so far
at the end of 2025.
Now India, the Reserve Bank of India, RBI,
has added approximately 75 tons since the start of 2024,
bringing their official total to around 188 tons.
So it's kind of smaller economies
adding to their gold reserves,
but it is still something to watch.
Turkey and China, both countries continue to buy
just at a slightly slower pace than 2022 and 2022.
China is actually sitting on about 2,300 tons
when it comes to gold.
United States still has the most.
This actually has little to do with the gold rally though.
I know this is another true third narrative,
the central banks, they're buying up gold left and right.
It's really just for the smaller countries.
This actually has more to do with the Federal Reserve
and what they're doing right now
when it comes to money supply.
Okay, quick question.
Is it also true that China, India and Russia
are buying so much silver or is that?
No, it's gold.
Okay.
When it comes to silver purchasing,
that has more to do with companies, industries,
especially silver right now.
We are starting to see a company like Samsung,
for example, in South Korea,
they just came out with a silver battery
which is groundbreaking innovation.
So that is part of why silver is going up.
Another reason is, well,
Trump has imposed tariffs that affects commodities
that help silver production.
So we're also seeing a supply shock
when it comes to silver more than gold.
Supply shock, we said.
Right, got it.
So not too dissimilar from what we're gonna be seeing
in oil this year.
So in this picture, I have the US global,
or yeah, the US M2 money supply.
So this is basically how much money is in circulation.
And as you can see, at the end of December,
it was going lower and lower,
but as soon as really closer later on this year,
it's increased more and more.
So this is a major factor
on why precious metals are going higher.
The Federal Reserve is,
this is essentially representing quantitative easing.
And increasing money supply.
So China, they also hold the largest share of global liquidity.
They've been, quote unquote, printing money in a lot too,
about 47 trillion worth, followed by the US and EU.
So while the US is starting to expand its balance sheet again,
they're buying assets rather than selling,
other major economies are a bit more aggressive
than the US actually.
Bank of England, the BOE,
we're talking about Carney earlier.
They cut rates to 4% in August, 2025,
and their economy has faced significant
disinflationary pressure.
So this is forcing them to ease policy
more rapidly than the Fed actually.
Now, speaking of Canada,
the Bank of Canada has been on a cutting spree.
So they're lowering the policy rate
to about 2.25% the interest rate as of 2025 December.
So this is another direct liquidity injection
into their housing sensitive economy.
So yeah, across the board,
we see that central banks are now holding more gold
than US Treasuries in their reserves
for the first time actually in 30 years.
And this is effectively telling us
that they don't trust the fiat that they're printing.
Interesting.
Yeah.
All right, are you good for just one minute?
If I go and check a roast,
I just don't want to...
Sure.
Okay, one sec, sorry.
I actually have somebody texting me right now.
I think they're trying to get into my place.
Yeah, I hope the roast is good, Beth, though.
So yeah, the next slide,
I'll show you the currency debasement on paper.
Like I was saying, though,
when it comes to manufacturing and services,
purchasing managers in the US,
they have been raising prices on goods and services
consistently the last couple of years.
So this isn't going to be fully accurate in real life,
but the struggle in the oil markets
tell us the global demand for old energy is stalling.
The record highs in gold tell us the demand for hard money
is just getting started.
So as the Fed hints at QE going into 2027,
quantitative easing, the market is shifting its focus.
So we're moving from a world price in oil
to a world hedged in bullion.
So these net long commitment of traders' positions
I've shown you earlier from the funds,
they aren't just a bet on a commodity price.
They're actually a bet against a weakening dollar.
So of course, as the Fed prints more money,
does more QE, of course, the dollar's going to get weaker,
which means to my next point,
we can see that Trump's latest threats around Greenland,
only pushed the traders away from the dollar more.
And it's actually the biggest declines this April.
And that was, of course, during the tariff panic
that we saw in the news.
So yeah, the bullish structures
on these commodities I've been showing you
is not likely to slow down.
So my outlook on the price of nettles
are actually still bullish until at least 2027.
What does that mean for consumers?
Does that mean the price of heating their homes
is going to go up and all of that kind of stuff,
and utilities and?
Yeah, most likely, unfortunately,
especially data centers were not helping with that.
They were raising energy costs across the board.
There's some argument on that.
Some are, the companies are saying, no, we're not.
We're lowering it.
That's definitely not true, though, boosts on the ground.
But for consumers, I think this is only
going to make prices higher for goods and services.
Like we've been seeing the supply managers
hint at, we'll probably see more
that rise later this year.
So yeah, the Fed, what I have here is,
the Fed's kind of in its dilemma.
Inflation is higher than they want it to be.
Their target is 2% historically.
Historically, that represents that
inflation is under control and the economy can grow.
But to keep rates low or to cut them,
which they're going to continue to do until 2027,
to service the massive national debt,
rising gold prices suggest that the market expects the Fed
to prioritize debt service over inflation fighting.
And it's certainly been the case.
I'll kind of show you why in a second.
This last chart, this actually shows
they've been quietly expanding their balance sheet
at the start of this year, actually.
As you can see right here on the right side.
So even though it's not officially quantitative easing,
money printing, the Fed has initiated purchases
of short-term treasury bonds to maintain bank reserves.
So in late 2025 and early 2026,
the Fed conducted reserve management purchases
about 40 billion per month.
So this creates new money out of thin air
to buy government debt, essentially.
And so the effective diluting,
this is diluting the dollar's purchasing power, of course,
and traders are going to move away from it.
Does it not give credence to the truth or narrative
that they print money and kill the dollar?
There's a bit of truth in that, yeah.
Historically, QE is definitely going to make the dollar weaker.
But these are cycles.
We have cycles of quantitative easing
and we have the opposite, quantitative tightening,
which we went over in a last show.
So it's not an end all be all.
These are just cycles that move every few years.
From after COVID, after the money printing then
to Joe Biden's presidency,
we really saw them do the opposite of money printing, actually.
Like I was showing you guys in the past.
But now they flip the script again.
So it depends what's going on with the economy.
And really, this is how the Fed controls the economy.
Right?
So yeah, coinciding with the Fed's actions,
the US Treasury has actually accelerated debt buyback program.
And in January this year,
the Treasury has scheduled operations to purchase
up to 38 billion off the run securities,
meaning those bonds per quarter for liquidity support.
So by repurchasing older, higher yielding debt
and replacing it with lower yielding issuance
as interest rates go down,
the Treasury is attempting to manage borrowing costs.
And this effectively acts as another layer of market support
that mirrors quantitative easing effects.
So this is going to tighten the supply of available bonds
and it's going to drive traders towards
safe havens like gold and silver.
Very good.
So this is a currency valuation across the board worldwide.
Year to date, the dollar has lost 10% on paper,
just in the currency market.
With the Fed forecasting a target rate
of down to close to 3% by the end of 2026,
or 3.4 I should say, and 3.1 by 2027,
the yield wall is actually protecting
the dollar from crumbling at the moment.
But as time goes on,
we'll probably see the dollar get a little weaker
in the next couple of years.
Any predictions for the Canadian dollar
or does it just follow along with the US basically?
Yeah, so the Canadian government
is actually cutting interest rates more than US.
It's down to almost 2% right now.
So yeah, the Canadian currency
certainly is going to see a bigger drop
than we saw last year.
It's 214, it's 20.5.
So as time goes on, we'll have to update this.
But last year, Canada lost about 5%,
compared to US lost 10%.
US was starting to cut more,
but now Canada's definitely catching up.
So yeah, if their Fed cuts rates,
if they rate cut while inflation remains sticky,
real yields on the bonds minus inflation
is going to drop further in negative territory.
So this kind of removes the primary deterrent
for holding gold, which pays no interest
but acts as a store of value in times like this.
Okay, so speaking of gold and silver,
gold in particular is actually the most crowded trade
according to Bank of America's
monthly global fund manager survey.
This is basically just a survey
showing what the top funds,
hedge funds, those kinds of sorts
are thinking about certain trades.
So it actually scored about 65% crowded score
as far as crowded trades go.
So if we do see a massive exit,
this could trigger a fire sale.
But I don't anticipate that to happen soon,
probably closer to 2028.
So yeah, while the commitment traders,
like I showed you earlier,
report what I've been tracking
and what my traders are doing,
their actual positions,
this Bank of America survey
actually tells you what they're thinking and fearing.
So it gathers data from roughly
200 and 250 institutional fund managers
who collectively oversee
between 500 billion, 700 billion in assets.
So because these participants
manage massive pension funds,
mutual funds and hedge funds,
the collective shift in opinion
often dictates where big money flows next.
Yeah.
So the average cash balance,
this is a most famous metric
from the Bank of America report.
And there's what's called the cash rule.
So historically,
the average cash levels rise above 4.5%.
It's contrarian
buy signal for stocks,
meaning fear is high.
And if cash falls below 3.5%,
historically it's more of a
it's a sell signal, greed is high.
So the latest one in January,
fund manager survey,
it's actually the most bullish since July 2021.
So they're expecting global growth
to have jumps, cash levels
have fallen to a record low of 3.2%.
And this is against equity,
protection against an equity sell off,
equity meaning stocks.
Since this number is the lowest
has been since January 2018.
So this is generally bullish
for stock market as well.
So, you know,
assets across the border are likely to go up.
Quantitative easing, of course,
is a big part of why stocks will likely go higher.
The Fed actually does
continue with rate cuts.
Okay.
What does both of them mean?
Because that to me now means
Beth the fresh air, but I bet they're saying that.
So it's Bank of America.
Bank of America, thank you.
Bank of America fund manager survey.
Okay.
I believe one of our first episodes.
Okay.
Now let's talk about employment.
You know, unfortunately,
because of Trump's bureau labor statistics,
they've been stalling the numbers.
And I think because the numbers
are so bad as of late.
December 2025 is the latest
jobs report we have.
It's a little bit behind,
but we're not having this data.
And this is basically showing that
the labor market is frozen right now.
And this is actually the most confusing
labor market report.
I've seen in recent memory.
Frozen meaning it's not going up and down.
Yeah.
Well, hiring is frozen.
Got it.
That's the frozen part.
There's a bit of a nuance though.
There is your to date from 2024 to 2025,
a 70% collapse in hiring.
So the headline number for December shows,
you know, we only added 50,000 jobs.
You know, anytime it's below 100,000 jobs added,
that's generally, you know,
almost recessionary levels.
And we actually missed the expectations
of 70 K jobs added versus 50.
You know, while that sounds like growth,
you know, 50,000 jobs added,
the context is actually much darker.
So 2024, the average was 167 jobs added per month
versus the 50 K that we have in December.
The 2025 average for the whole year
was 49,000 jobs added per month
versus the 167 jobs added 2024.
So that's where the 70% decline
in hiring comes from.
Yeah, boots on the ground.
My son and his friends are all talking
about how incredibly difficult it is
to get a job.
Now that's also partly due to immigration,
right?
Because they don't hire white guys,
especially young white guys anymore.
That's, you know, unfortunately,
that's been the trend.
This is like a remember, unfortunately,
because, you know, there still are some DEI efforts.
It depends where you are,
what company you're working with.
But yeah, you know, in general,
the more well the company, yeah,
they're not going to hire white guys.
You know, I bet that's more of a trend in Canada,
just because of the large Asian
and Indian population you guys have
compared to US,
which by the way,
I don't consider Indians Asians.
They can try to claim that as much as they want,
but it's just not true at all.
Their cultures are vastly different,
especially East Asia.
They really are.
Those guys are smart.
Indians, they definitely exaggerate their IQs.
Right, right.
Sam has a good comment here.
When cash is down, greed is high.
Does bullish restocks?
Yes.
That's what this is representing.
Yep.
And in case you didn't see it,
at least this is such a phenomenal presentation.
Thank you for listening.
Yeah, so, you know,
job creation has collapsed 70%
year over year.
At current levels,
US has not created enough jobs
to keep up with the population growth actually.
We have a tale of two surveys
and this is kind of why
the labor market is confusing right now
because the report is a statistical mess.
The two main ways we measure jobs
are different things.
There is what's called the household survey
and this is showing 232,000 jobs added
and this counts self-employed
and gig workers like Uber drivers, for example.
But it is notoriously noisy
and volatile historically.
Most analysts trust the business survey,
which is showing the 50k jobs added
in the non-farm payrolls
and that shows the market is effectively frozen
when it comes to hiring jobs added.
There are major three red flags here
for US economy in particular.
You know, there is a revision disaster going on.
We found, you know,
they've been recalculating the numbers
in the past few months
and saying, oh, it's actually lower
than we thought it was
and they just keep doing that over and over.
We saw that last year.
We found that, you know,
October's wasn't just slow,
it was a disaster, okay?
It was revised down to negative 173,000 jobs added.
So that's one of the worst crisis readings
in history when it comes to this metric.
You know, basically almost all job growth
came from just three sectors.
Food service, healthcare and social assistance.
Does it stimulate self-employment?
Does it make people throw up their hands
and go like, fuck jobs, work for yourself?
Yeah, you know,
it's kind of like what we saw during the GFC in 08.
We saw newer companies taking more market cap,
more market share, I should say,
from some of the bigger players
that were more established.
So entrepreneurism will probably be on a rise
given these job levels.
I don't know if you guys
have heard this anecdotally,
but from young people fresh out of college
to experienced high-level executives,
they've been sending hundreds,
thousands of job applications
and they don't hear anything back.
So as long as this continues,
which we're seeing in the data that it is,
people are going to have to get creative.
Exactly.
And in the end, that's really good, right?
Because compared to a job
that you don't really have to be strong
and resilient and resourceful
and live on your wits
and all that kind of thing.
So I think ultimately that will strengthen
the ability to have more people
needing to get creative.
Yeah.
When it comes to most people,
they really have to be pushed to a corner
to start that business
or take that risk,
which right now, as you can see,
is really not as risky as it may seem,
those kind of decisions.
So yeah,
even though hiring is slow,
wages are kind of rising.
So this kind of creates
a kind of federal reserve.
They're going to go off, you know,
these fudged numbers
from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
And they don't want to cut rates
to help the slowing job growth market,
but wages might keep inflation
from falling at the same time.
My view though is,
you know, the worse this gets,
like it has been,
this is definitely a perfect excuse
for the Fed to cut interest rates.
And that's why they have been
they have two
decisions on interest rates.
You know, first is the labor market.
Is it starting to decrease?
And then also inflation.
But, you know, the second, the latter,
they just have not been prioritizing at all.
It has been going a little bit higher
and jobs have been getting worse.
So, you know, the macro outlook is,
you know, the Fed,
despite this weird data traders,
they still expect to rate cuts
at the very least in 2026.
If we do look at how smart money
is pricing this in,
they're really pricing in about
four to five interest rate cuts
in the later half of this year.
When it comes to unemployment,
unemployment is actually
lower than it might sound
based on all this is at 4.4%.
It did actually fall slightly
from 4.5%,
which it prevents people
from panicking about immediate recession,
but the underlying hiring trend
in years.
So the labor market
isn't falling off a cliff yet,
but that's why I'm calling it frozen.
You know, in macro terms, frozen
markets eventually crack over time.
Right.
Can I ask you a question?
Maybe it's a little premature
for your presentation here,
but with the job market having
so much to do with AI
and taking over for that
and corporations greedily
following some like
short term bottom line,
I would have to assess
from my perspective.
Now, when you have consumers who are
struggling and they can't spend
money with the corporations,
doesn't that work directly against
them or are they just really
short-sighted or am I often
thinking?
I'm sorry, what was the question?
My ADHD is kicking in.
No problem.
So then, you know,
productivity out of technology,
then they are out of people.
But the people are not going to be
because they're not employed.
They don't have the money to spend
in the economy.
So is that just short-sighted on
their part?
Extremely.
Extremely short-sighted.
The Trump admin really represents
the new money over the old money.
The new money meaning
Palantir, Peter Thiel,
those kind of
entities, let's call it.
JD Vance is basically
Peter Thiel's
puppet, right?
Especially the links to the
AI industry in Ohio,
which JD Vance is from.
The guy is a total plan.
Fake wife, fake family, it's
ridiculous.
So yeah, this is definitely
short-sighted.
They're just really prioritizing
their top donors in the
economy.
But essentially, this is going to
make employment worse.
The more they prioritize the AI,
the less they prioritize
the average person, unfortunately.
So yeah, this is
not going to be good for the
economy in the long run.
Like I said, this frozen market
eventually will crack.
We just see a bit of decline in
consumer spending last year.
It has gone a little bit higher.
So we'll probably see a little
bit of consumer spending first
half this year.
But second half, I'm not so
bullish on.
So yeah,
so this chart is actually
showing like an oops moment
statistical fluke.
So we're seeing a massive surge
in labor productivity, like
you said,
the fastest in two years.
Thanks to AI.
But that production is being
driven by capital expenditure
in artificial intelligence.
So basically companies investing
in AI data setters, chips,
et cetera,
rather than human headcount.
So from a quantitative
perspective,
the math is straightforward,
but it's definitely troubling to
me.
Even though output is rising, it
does help GDP
because AI and automation are
amplifying
efficiency.
Real wages are lagging.
And like I said, the prices
are going to continue to go up
this year next year
based on what we're seeing
in the supply manager.
There's going to be a surplus
created by this new technology.
It's going to expand corporate
margins rather
than payroll.
If the jobs data, like I've
been showing you, continues on
this trend,
then yeah, consumers
are going to have really much
money to spend.
And really, if the corporate
still make up for it, then
we're in big trouble.
As of right now, they are
making up for it in the very
short term, but that's not
going to stay like that forever.
Right. When you look at
government jobs, which I
think, I don't know
numerically, but it's a big
thing in Canada.
That's how they get power is
they just turn everyone into
employee of their corporation,
which is not a corporation
actually. I shouldn't say that
anymore.
So then
do you think this is a
question? Do you think that
governments are as hip
on using AI to replace
all of their employees?
So also working against them?
Yeah. Absolutely.
I actually seen that in this
chart right now.
Now, of course, these
numbers are fudged to
really benefit Trump in the
headlines is truth social
pose.
You're saying, Hey, there's
fewer government jobs, more
private sector jobs.
But if you look at the
private sector jobs, they're
really just to build the
infrastructure.
After that, they're
unnecessary that you only
need like tens of
people to manage these
facilities, the data
centers especially.
So yeah, I do.
I do think, you know, the
government will continue to
decrease jobs.
I believe the U.S.
Department of Defense has
officially started using
GROC AI
has given access to
some of their employees.
So, you know, GROC has just
absolutely trashed my opinion
and I don't see how that's
a good thing.
Right. Right. Interesting.
A question from the chat
here is the
NFP bad numbers driven
mainly by AI
layoffs.
Maybe we just said that.
Yeah, absolutely.
Across the industries,
besides health care, food
and one more I can't remember.
They have, you know,
the employers have actually
been saying, yeah, we're
seeing more productivity
because we're using AI agents
to replace humans with.
The agents are getting better.
The more infrastructure
is being built.
Right. So I don't expect
that to slow down either
because, you know,
an agent is probably going
to be faster than human
in putting things into Excel.
Right.
Clearly. Yeah.
Yeah. I'm two minds about
all that.
Marco said I'm going to just
pound the Rothschild's
retirement funds 1099s
for pre-tax, crypto and stocks
is a total nightmare
to deal with. Any comment
there?
Sorry, I'm a little confused.
I'm going to pound the Rothschild
retirement funds.
I'm not sure what that means.
Okay. Well, you have to
clarify for us, Marco.
Yeah.
Yeah. You know, I miss all this
crypto has stayed subdued
in this price levels.
Yeah. Interesting.
Yeah. We've moved from digital
to hard assets, which is
interesting.
Some things are up like
privacy coins are up.
Oh, interesting.
Yeah. I really don't track
that.
You know, Bitcoin is kind
of like an index for
for crypto.
So that's really the main one
I look at.
So, yeah, you know,
that's definitely the bad
thing that or bad things I
should say I've seen in the
economy for the U.S.
AI agents are improving.
And I think this helps explain
how we have improving
productivity and services
while employment is declining
for the first half,
especially in manufacturing.
That's probably been the most
hit.
So, you know, this tweet
from Trump is just a
massive cope
and is hiding the fact that
AI is wiping out jobs
through improved agent
models.
You know, federal government
jobs only count for so much.
It's not that much.
You know, the narrative being
floated by dumb money is that
the drama and Venezuela is
being used to boost the U.S.
economy.
Even though, you know,
even if that is true,
it isn't going to work, right?
As we highlighted earlier,
the U.S. does need more
energy than they had the
capacity for the fuel,
the amount of data centers,
wattage usage.
So it's not so easy as
we're saying the Venezuela
oil can sustain this
like we showed earlier.
So, you know, nuclear too,
that's being hyped up right now
by dumb money,
but that isn't going to be
online really into 2030.
So, we're pulling the
cart before the horse.
Between the AI is our
God crowd
and the Trump is going to
save the economy crowd.
You know, those are often
juxtaposed if not the
same people.
There you go.
And Marco clarified
that
Roth retirement funds
is post-tax retirement funds.
Okay.
So, I thought you were talking
about the Rothschilds.
You probably said that in a
jokingly manner,
but what he's referring to
is the Roth IRA,
which is a U.S.
retirement account.
And like you said,
you know, it is tax-free
on like 401Ks.
You do pay tax
on that later.
So, the only reason
you would prioritize a Roth
over a 401K
is if you think taxes
are going to go higher
over time,
which I tend to agree with.
I think the Roth is a
smarter move for most people.
But for most people,
they should be maxing out both.
Okay.
If you're employed.
So, yeah, this chart
illustrates the
secured overnight
financing rate
forward curve.
So, it just shows,
you know, the markets
expecting future
interest rate cuts
in the United States
to go down to
close to 3%
by early 2028.
You know,
while the news is making you
believe Powell,
Trump Powell,
the head of the Federal Reserve
is going to prison,
you know, as of this year,
the situation involving
Powell in the Department of Justice
has reached a boiling by it.
You know, historically,
there's going to be
a lot of legal mess here,
political safeguards.
You know, Congress really
controls the Fed,
not DOJ.
So, it suggests
that indictment
is unlikely for the Fed.
And that Powell will
likely finish his term as chair.
Okay.
So, this is why the rate
cuts are priced in
after he leaves, actually.
He's finished with his
term in May.
Okay.
So, you know,
Powell has revealed that
under the Attorney General
Pam Bondi,
he was served
Federal Reserve
or he was served
a grand jury subpoena.
So, it's not an official
arrest, right?
It's really just a probe.
You know,
the focus and the
investigation is whether
Powell misled Congress
last year regarding the
two-and-a-half billing
renovation of the Fed's
historical buildings.
And it's Powell
that's done in May?
Correct.
Yep.
So, as soon as he leaves,
you know, this number
might go even lower
because he's been holding
back an interest
more than the other
Fed governors would like.
Yeah, you've been
bullish Powell.
I said that right.
I have.
You know, I actually don't
mind the guy.
He's trying to sound
the alarms like,
hey, you know,
the more we cut race,
that's not going to be good
in the short to long term,
right?
So,
it's definitely troubling
to see,
especially the inflation
going higher.
That's really the whole point
of QT is the lower
inflation,
but we haven't seen that
happen really
the last year.
A quick question about
USDC versus Stable Coins?
I buy.
Sorry,
I just think Stable Coins
are shit.
It's just the USD,
right?
There is no Stable Coin
without the USD.
So it's pointless.
You're just transferring
money to a third party
when you could just
hold dollars yourself.
Got it.
Thank you.
Yeah.
And it also holds
a little bit of commodities
like gold,
for example.
So you get a higher
return on investment
just,
you know,
doing these things yourself
instead of outsourcing it
to
something that is really
easily hackable
has been proven over time.
But yeah,
that's just my opinion
on Stable Coins
and crypto in general.
Could you see that ever
changing?
Your opinion on
precious metals
has shifted?
Maybe.
Maybe if the US
does adopt a digital
currency,
which I doubt it will
anytime soon
in our lifetime,
but we'll have to see
I'm willing to change
my position
if new data comes in.
But so far as the data
has been showing,
this is really just
Trump pumping
his Trump coin.
His son is on the
advisory board
these crypto firms.
So this is all fake news
really.
Got it.
So if you look at
the past two decades,
you can see on this chart
inflation on paper
is actually averaging
around 2.7%.
And that's roughly where
we are today,
supposedly,
but if we look
at the purchasing
manager index
for both manufacturing
and services,
we can see prices
are going to keep going
higher.
So this is a major
difference between
what we're seeing
in the CPI numbers
in reality.
Now,
speaking of metals,
I do want to give
some opportunity
on how you can take
advantage of everything
that we covered today.
Some of you
might have missed out
on the Golden Silver
Rally,
but based on
my report,
you might be a little bit
bullish on it still.
As shown in this chart
here,
gold and precious metals
remain a relatively
small allocation
within global portfolios.
It's only estimated
1% to 2% of assets
globally,
currently allocated
to gold stocks.
So the
light blue line
is the
precious metal index.
And overlaid is
the US
precious metal allocations
worldwide.
So,
there has a lot of room
to catch up here.
And then
this next slide
shows despite
triple-digit gains
that precious metals
saw in 2025,
I believe gold stocks
could actually continue
to outperform gold
in 2026.
Gold companies remain
at historically low values,
valuations based
on most metrics.
And while stocks
experience a re-rating
in the second half
of 2025,
this came after
almost two decades
of persistent
re-rating.
So, gold stocks
could actually be
your next opportunity
potentially
as this year
moves on.
And like I was
showing the interest rate
expectations,
it could even go
into 2028.
So, it's not late
for the stocks.
It would be
a little late
for the actual
metals, right?
Yeah.
You know,
especially physical,
you know,
you're really going to
screw it over
on the dealer spread.
They're going to charge
you at least 10%
over spot,
spot meaning just,
you know,
what the market is
actually pricing in.
So, the market is pricing
in about 4,800 ounce.
If you try to buy
from a dealer,
it's going to be closer
to 5,000 or,
if not more.
So, you know,
that's one thing
you could do on your own.
I'll let you do
your own due diligence
and find,
you know,
the gold and silver
miners by yourself.
I'm not going to,
you know,
that's more for
my trading group.
But it is a macro
outlook I have.
And then,
you know,
speaking of my trading group,
I was going to say,
why don't you say
something about it
just because I do
have a hard stop
in 14 minutes.
Yeah.
This is the last slide
actually.
Okay.
Great.
You know,
despite gold or silver
for that matter,
having 150% gain
in 2025,
this is the return
I got just
trading index options.
And I wasn't
betting on a direction
like I wasn't betting
the horse or the farm.
I should say that
all stocks are going
to go up
or they're going to go
down.
I didn't take a direction.
I actually traded
both directions
because I'm
directionally agnostic.
Which is your
paradigm of trading,
right?
Exactly.
So no matter what
the market does,
you have a hedge.
Exactly.
It's inevitable.
The markets are going
to move up or down,
right?
Over time.
So I'm not
actually buying the
stock itself.
I'm trading
contracts
that are
pricing the movements
both up and down.
And you know,
with these option contracts
it limits my risk.
As you can see here,
this is asymmetric
where my losses were,
you know,
for the $2,000 account,
I was showing an example.
Anyone can do this
with a very small amount
of money.
With this,
you know,
you took
about almost $2,000
in losses
if we round up.
But
the wins
were seven,
almost $8,000.
So,
you know,
with options
and how smart money trades
like I demonstrated
in the group,
you're limiting
your losses
and you're lending your upside,
almost be
virtually unlimited.
Now, assuming
stocks can
technically go to infinity
and not saying it will,
but
if you do the math right
on the risk reward,
you can get this kind of result.
So, so far it's up
150%
last year.
But
the return on capital trading
like this
in the group,
you got almost
300%
for more than double
Silver's rise
in just one year.
Great.
Now,
this strategy in particular,
I'm highlighting
because
this doesn't involve
stock picking
or doing research.
It doesn't even involve
like a long course.
Actually,
this is what I call the
five minute
trading portfolio.
So,
it literally is what it sounds
like it only takes five minutes
to put this on
and you just copy
basically what I do,
you don't even have to take,
you know,
whole course.
I just have one video
how to implement this
and we trade together
as a group.
So,
you know,
a lot of my traders
are just copying
what I'm doing.
You know,
they don't have to say
glue to the screen.
They're not day trading.
They can place these
orders overnight
because I'm assuming
most of you are working
full-time
or you have a full-time
business.
So,
yeah,
with five minutes
once every few months,
you can implement this.
Nice.
And I'm sharing a link
to the
Twitter business
builders here
if you'd like to
check it out.
This is a link
that I've been gifted
so I will benefit
if anyone signs up
through me.
So, thank you very much
for doing that.
You don't have to.
And thank you to Brandon
for giving me this.
Of course.
Yeah, Beth, you know,
she shows up every week
on our weekly calls,
our live calls.
I love that.
It's been a lot of fun
and I actually
included a QR code
that includes your link, Beth.
Okay.
Oh, thank you very much.
If you want to support
Beth
and also join this group
at the same time,
this QR code
will allow you to do so.
Very kind.
Thank you.
So, yeah,
I know I'm going to be
wrong at least 50% of the time.
As you can see here,
I have a win score of five
and a loss score of four,
which is generally that, right?
But even that,
as long as you make the math
asymmetric,
which is pretty easy to do
and I'll demonstrate
for you guys continually.
You can get this kind of results.
So you can start
with a few thousand
all the way to higher.
Very good.
Yeah, it's,
it's lovely
because there's no big
a grandi,
you know,
a grandisement
and oh, I make the best trades
always ever.
And I mean,
you're one of the smartest guys.
I know Brandon.
And,
and then,
so you're just demonstrating
in a humble way
what actually works
rather than trying
to make these claims
that everything is going to
be so great
and you're so great.
Yeah, you know,
kind of like my other work.
I'm not trying to reinvent
the wheel on any of this stuff.
Right.
Especially financial stuff.
So really,
I just took
a trading strategy
that Morgan Stanley
created in the 1980s.
Goldman Sachs actually
perfected in the early 2000s
and it's basically
just long short
meaning you're
directly agnostic.
You know that you're not going
to be a hundred percent right,
but we can still
make the math
asymmetric.
So really,
I'm just taking this
on a smaller scale
for you guys
because those guys
are managing billions.
Right.
They have multiple positions,
not just the index
like I'm showing you here.
But this is,
you know,
similar system
exact same kind of math
that anyone can implement.
You know,
no experience is needed.
Wonderful.
That's really great.
So I'm not seeing any more
questions in the chat.
Is there anything else
that you wanted to share
with us today?
That's a great presentation,
by the way.
No,
you know,
I think we covered really
the whole gambit here.
Okay.
Very efficient.
Thanks for bringing a
presentation gets me off
the hook for trying to,
you know,
full disclosure,
I really didn't know
one thing.
I came into your class
the first year.
I'm literally just trying
to hear and feel
and be in the culture
of that
because my,
all my life I've blocked it
or looked away
or just not looked in.
and so it's,
it's a good subject.
It's the same way
I've taken on the toxic
biopair.
I'm in all the medical
literature that it,
it refers to.
At first,
it's just like,
I can't even share it.
It's just this wall of words.
And I have to,
but,
but now I'm listening
and it's like,
yeah,
you say to me something
like alcohol dehydrogenase
and my brain right away
is doing the math
on the D means
less hydrogen
and there's
the alcohol is poison
and you know,
so it comes in.
I like,
I like learning
in that environment
with you in particular.
Yeah, you know,
it's one of the reasons
I stay looking so young.
I don't know if you guys
can believe this,
but I'm actually aged 30
this year.
So, you know,
I've kept my youth
because I don't work
for money.
I let my money
work for me.
Well done.
Yeah, you're a good example.
And Sam is saying,
thank you for this presentation.
You are very welcome.
All right.
So,
then I think that's all.
Again,
if anybody would like
to check out the link
is also in the notes below.
So if you're seeing this
after the fact
and you don't catch
the QR code
or the chat,
then you can find
that trader business
builders link
long link
in the notes
down below.
And I do recommend it.
It's pretty
pretty risk-free
for a big education.
You get access
to your whole school
account there
that's got
year, you know,
the two years of recordings
and the classes
to two,
two,
at least two rounds
of the actual
eight week class that you do.
Walking people
step by step.
I really stopped
implementing just because
I saw
people don't really
want to take courses
and it makes sense.
I've experienced
courses as well
and they suck, you know,
time intensive.
It's
you can't get monotonous.
So that's why
I'm really focusing on
the five minute portfolio
because this can get
your results
within a few months
if you implemented
correctly.
And you're very attentive
also to the markets
on a daily basis.
So you're always
putting information
into the forum
and helping people
to engage with it,
asking questions
and
and making polls
and that kind of thing.
So yeah,
it's really good.
Be the best.
Be
the is best.
I do not understand.
Beth is best.
Something like that.
Thank you if that's
what I meant.
All right, everyone.
Well, thank you very much
for joining today
and giving attention
to this.
I always have
a good feeling
about that.
Like I said at the beginning
reality is better
than the made up stuff.
And
this week I'm
hosting Matt
Arit.
I was actually going to
maybe mention it to you, Brent
and as well.
I'm doing a series
on the Beth of Fresh Air
on the evolution
of culture and society.
So it's a mega topic.
It's like, you know,
it could go in
a lot of different directions
and no doubt
at some point sooner or later
we could do one
on economics
and finance
because that's
a massive part
of our culture roles.
This week it's going
to be Matt Arit
who is a
actually related
to what we're talking
about today
who's an expert
in geopolitical
evolution
of culture
and society.
So he's a really
smart guy,
a good guy
and he genuinely
wants to change
the landscape
of the culture
for the better
and that's
what I'm after
with this series.
The first
of the series
that is called
Evolve My Son
came for
an interview
and I asked him
about his perspective
and
we got some nasty
one nasty Karen
in the chat
there that
just couldn't resist.
I'm sure they've been
following me
for the whole time already
just waiting for a chance
to do some
shit talking
and they did
and in a way
it's kind of fun
because
Liam's a good
I don't know
example
of being
able to think
and
come from
a place
that is
well beyond
where I was at
19
like just absolutely
you know
on the moral side
on the intelligence
on the
basic awareness
of what's going on
in his world
he's really ahead
so
that's worth watching
and then
the week after
Dagmar Stansova
is coming to talk about
the evolution
of the performing arts
in particular
because that's her niche
so yeah this series
will probably go on
for quite a while
and you can join us
always going to be Friday
at 2 p.m.
central time.
You know
if we have time
for another show
on that
new podcast for yours
maybe we can talk about
the anti-Asian protocols
that I've done
I don't know if you guys can tell
but I am
half Korean
so
I've been doing a deep dive
on
you know
the culture behind that
as of late
Did you say
insight agents
or did I miss that entirely?
Oh you missed that entirely
Okay
What did you say then?
Um
I was just talking about
that anti-aging
Anti-aging
Yeah
Not insight agents
Ah yeah
right right
Oh absolutely
absolutely let's do that
that would be a wonderful
topic for that
Yep
Great
Yeah fantastic
and it looks like
that's going to show up
in your school as well
a little bit
you've got a course coming out
So it's going to be
more of a guide
than a course
Okay
I'm just going to be
sharing what I'm doing
nothing financial
in that group
it's going to be a separate
thing
it's more for fun
actually
it's not going to be
it's more of a
passion project in mind
Wonderful
that's really good
All right everyone
have a beautiful
rest of your day
thanks again for joining
and helping to
share this out
if at all possible
that would be good
lots of love for now
Branton
and everybody here
See you guys later
Okay
and
let's see
I just have to
set this up
sorry
to go on the screen
give me one second
play us out
ah that's a different
podcast
I'm confused
who am I
okay
one more
one more try
we'll split personality
problem over here
and
we're out